The build for the QEMU phase now runs Matchbox as the default UI.  I’ve integrated an xterm patch from Buildroot’s source tree and launch it as the default application, allowing some runtime testing through the UI. Today I also finished integration of the surf browser into the buld.  This was […]

BeagleBox update: Matchbox is now the default UI, surf ...

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I’ve gotten the embedded bug lately.  I dug around for an interesting hardware platform to work with and stumbled across the BeagleBoard.  This 3×3″ board provides impressive multimedia capabilities via the TI OMAP35xx processor.  It appears to serve the purpose I had long ago thought about for the miniITX boards […]

Announcing BeagleBox: Internet video platform for the BeagleBoard

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One of the drawbacks to dropping cable TV was losing summer broadcasts of pro tennis.  Recently my wife and daughter pointed out that you could watch some matches online via ESPN3.  So I tried to get it on the media box hooked to the big screen TV. I’ve got F12 […]

64 vs 32 bit flash: getting full screen flash ...

Google continues to make changes to Google News that are of no real benefit.  They do it in order to satisfy news sources and generate revenue.  But the point of a service like Google News is *not* to benefit news sources but to benefit the readers who wish to choose […]

Google News is now irrelevant – Moving to Good Noows

I've spent the past month preparing for and implementing a migration from Comcast cable TV to relying on both off-air HDTV and Internet video.  The easy part was dumping Comcast, though they magically managed to NOT turn off billing because they had to send out a service tech (for no […]

From Cable TV to Internet TV – A Nerd’s Journey

SourceForge has posted an edited version of the email-interview I did with them. Still a decent write up. Thanks to the SourceForge team for the exposure!

SourceForge write up on XNotesNG

I tested the antenna in my basement with the first of two digital converters (the second from Amazon still hasn't arrived even though it was ordered the same day) and an analog TV.  The antenna was able to pick up all the expected channels which antennaweb.org said we should get.  […]

Antenna up, first digital box tested

The problem with getting rid of cable TV comes from the desire to continue to receive local off-air broadcasts.  When the government mandated switch to digital broadcasts occurred, cable users ignored it because the cable companies would handle the situation for us.  As long as we were plugged into the […]

Dumping cable: not as easy as it might seem

Today I released a complete rewrite of XNotesPlus, which I've renamed XNotesNG.  This version was properly architected (well, mostly) and implemented in Java.  Unlike other Java developers, I don't use IDEs like Eclipse or NetBeans.  Instead, I rely on the tried and true tools of kernel developers:  cscope and vi.  […]

XNotesNG: XNotesPlus never dies, it just evolves

Good news:  the wife okay’d the cable disconnect over lunch today.  I’m going to look for ways to hook up antenna’s to the TV’s through out the house.  I could hook it the incoming cable distribution box but I need that, at least for now, to keep the cable modem.  […]

The General’s Approval

Here in the armpit of America known as Colorado Springs we have one cable provider, Comcast, at least in the area we live in.  For the past four years we've had Extended Basic Cable service for about $50/month with no cable boxes required.  Two xmas's ago our "big" projection TV […]

Comcast is going bye-bye

I built an Ubuntu Server image this week because I needed to test an application we built at work would work without X.org and GTK+ installed.  Turns out it does.  That’s good. But in testing I got annoyed with the 80 character width of the console.  See, Ubuntu Server doesn’t […]

Mounting KVM images manually